First Drive-In Restaurant

[jon]

I was just reading where Edmonton's first drive-in restaurant was opened in time for the 1939 Royal Visit.

I then wondered when The White Spot started doing Drive-Ins. Answer: 1928.

I knew they started that early, but I had forgotten that they were doing Drive-Ins from the beginning.

As my Edmonton history book was mentioning, even 1939 was extremely early for Drive-Ins. A&W pretty much owned the (Edmonton) market at the beginning of the 1960s.

As American Graffiti showed, listening to the Radio was very popular at Drive-Ins.

[CubbyCam]

Back in 1962 or so, radio was huge at the drive-in restaurants... I was in Calgary, and any time you found a hit song on the radio, you'd crank it... then everyone else in the parking lot would punch buttons till they found it and cranked up as well. I had a buddy who had one of the first in-car RECORD players... Played 45's... and our favourite sport was slippin' in the latest hot song... crankin' it up and watching everyone else in the parking lot punchin' buttons and dialin' dials... forever. Those Phillips players were just a hint of what was to come. Happy memories.

[radiofan]

Cam's memory plus Jon's mention of A&W's in Edmonton triggered one that I'd heard from several people who grew up in Edmonton. They all said they didn't listen to CJCA or CHED when they were hangin' out at the A&W at night, everyone would be tuned to 1410 and CFUN was blasting out from cars all over the lot. I'm sure CFUN had lots of listeners in Calgary too as they put in a nice signal there (almost 24/7 in the winter).

[groundwave]

Back in those days, new 45's retailed in the vicinity of only 50 cents to a buck. I used to pick up used "juke" discs in surprisingly good shape for a quarter. Those are some of my happy memories.

[Mike Cleaver]

Cruising the 'dub was the thing for Kelowna teens to do back in the early '60's.
They had just opened on part of the parking lot of the then new Capri Hotel complex which included Kelowna's first shopping mall.
The other teen hang out was the Dairy Queen on Pandosy and the Shady Rest just off Highway 97 south of the A&W.

[RationalKeith]

A couple of links to history especially of car hops and the serving trays:
http://www.aw.ca/cruisin-the-dub.nsf/newsletter/$FILE/Spring08.pdfpage 14
though fems may prefer the original car hops: http://www.islandword.com/go28a/Bikes_Burgers_and_Root_Beer
http://www.whitespot.com/?p2=/modules/blog/viewcomments.jsp&bid=19

(I dug those up in response to Red Robinson's recent quiz question on where A&W trays went - inside or outside.)

[J Kendrick]

I was just reading where Edmonton's first drive-in restaurant was opened in time for the 1939 Royal Visit.

I then wondered when The White Spot started doing Drive-Ins. Answer: 1928.

The Vancouver area's very first drive-in restaurant actually predates Nat Bailey's White Spot by two years... the late Chick Chamberlain's original Tomahawk Barbecue on Marine Drive in North Vancouver... in 1926.

[Neumann Sennheiser]

The Vancouver area's very first drive-in restaurant actually predates Nat Bailey's White Spot by two years... the late Chick Chamberlain's original Tomahawk Barbecue on Marine Drive in North Vancouver... in 1926.

Legend has it that Bryan Adams worked there as a teenager busing tables.
He used to brag to all the other bus boys and waiters that he was going to be a big rock star someday and they'd all be able to say that they knew him when.
A tough case to make while up to your elbows cleaning bacon fat out of a grease trap.

[ThisIsNotCBC]

Cruising the 'dub was the thing for Kelowna teens to do back in the early '60's.
They had just opened on part of the parking lot of the then new Capri Hotel complex which included Kelowna's first shopping mall.
The other teen hang out was the Dairy Queen on Pandosy and the Shady Rest just off Highway 97 south of the A&W.

Cruising the 'Dub still is a popular thing to do, except now their drive-ins have given way to drive-thrus. My experience with that was with Port Alberni's old A&W drive-in about 30 years ago, enjoying their burgers while listening to the restaurant's stereo playing the old KNWR-FM back in the day.